Skip Barber School for New Drivers: A 17-Year-Old and The Skid Pad

It's one thing to watch your teenager trundle off with a driving instructor on city streets and another to watch her at a race track. Or at least in the paddock of Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca, where the Skip Barber School holds a one-day session for new drivers. Holly, who is 17, has been a good learner on the street, but how would she react to panic stops or slipping and sliding on a wet skid pad? – John Lamm

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Read about Holly's experience in her own words:

The words skid pad hold much more meaning to me now than they ever have. The same goes for my respect of car brakes and NEVER texting while driving.

Our first order of business at the Skip Barber School was to get a "physics" lesson. It was all about the dynamics of cars and their wheels and brake systems. Although I was learning a lot, I kept longing for the screeching sounds of racing cars outside. Finally, after the lesson, we all went outside to the amazing world of the race track.

The first thing we did was to learn how to drive the school's Mazda3s with a clutch. Sad to say, I never did completely get the hang of it.

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Next, we did a drill in which there were 3 lanes and at the end of each lane was a green light. As the drill began, we would start driving towards the lights at 40 mph. Suddenly one of the lights would stay green and the other two would turn red, and you would have to swerve to go towards the green light. It was a lot harder than I thought!

The next drill we did was the skid pad! Finally, after what seemed like hours of longingly watching the Mazda RX-8s sliding around, it was my turn to shine...or at least try to. The point of the exercise was to practice gaining control when you are in a skid, but I just wanted to spin in circles, which I did multiple times. I even managed to do a complete 360, twice. It was definitely the best moment of my driving life. After fooling around for a few spins, it was time to take care of business. I was actually pretty good at gaining control. (My dad was quite impressed!)

Our third drill was to go as fast as you could until you reached a line of cones and then to stop as quickly as possible. This test was pretty easy until it was time to shape the lines of cones into a curve. Then it got much harder and the poor little cones never stood a chance against my tires.

The most eventful part of the day was the relay race and a gymkhana course in a Mazda Miata. Before we started I was thinking that it would be a non-issue, until we were told that the car we would be driving had a clutch. When it was my turn I was ready to go, my adrenaline was pumping and all went well until I tried to brake and it didn't work. I had no clue what was going on. I thought the car was broken, but then I realized I was stepping on the clutch, not the brake. Oh well. Our relay team came in second.

Last exercise of the day was the driving and texting experiment. First we went around the track normally, than we went around the same track while texting. I completely went off the course without even finishing my text. Yep, I will NEVER ever try texting while driving in the real world.

I came away impressed with the Skip Barber New Driver School. It was a good experience and I learned more about driving in those 5 hours than I had in the previous 6 months. – Holly Lamm